Edward Gardner

Introduction

Chief Conductor of the Bergen Philharmonic since October 2015, Edward Gardner has already led the orchestra on multiple international tours, including acclaimed performances in London, Berlin, Munich and Amsterdam and continuing his hugely successful relationship with Chandos Records.

In demand as a guest-conductor, the 2017/18 season will see Edward debut with the New York Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony and Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and return to the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, London Philharmonic Orchestra and Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin. He will also continue his longstanding collaborations with the Philharmonia Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (where he was Principal Guest Conductor from 2010-16) and BBC Symphony Orchestra (whom he has conducted at both the First and Last Night of the BBC Proms).

Music Director of English National Opera for ten years (2006-15), Edward continues to work with the world’s major opera companies. He has ongoing relationships with La Scala and Opéra National de Paris, and with New York’s Metropolitan Opera where he has conducted productions of Carmen, Don Giovanni, Der Rosenkavalier and Werther. Future plans include a return to Dutch National Opera and his Royal Opera House Covent Garden debut.

“What a superb concert this was, with Edward Gardner in magisterial form on the podium, ensuring that Sibelius’s structurally magnificent Symphony No. 2 was played with the sort of authority that honours that heritage.”

“The musicians, under Gardner’s baton, created a fabulous rendition of this overture with effective emphasis on the variations of tone throughout. There was great precision from the brass section and the rousing finale almost raised the roof of the Usher Hall.”

“Edward Gardner […] manned his guest spot on the podium with equal parts flair and introspection throughout […] and made his attentive all-American players reinforce every subtle quaver and every noble quiver. [He] made it all seem grand and generous, and that is no mean trick.”

“Gardner is among the rising stellars of his generation of British conductors, and his ongoing series of orchestral and choral discs on the Chandos label marks him as an exceptional talent.”

“In any case, the CSO players responded well to Gardner’s vigorous, expressive manner, to his tensile way of signaling what he wanted from them at any given moment in the score. One could read his physical involvement in the music from his athletic eyebrows alone.”

“Conductor Edward Gardner led the BBC Symphony Orchestra off at a brisk pace, lifting the end of each phrase; the playing was charged and snappy, the spring coiled tight […] The First Night is always meant to be a celebration of some kind, but it doesn’t often get to be as affirmative as this.”

“The British conductor is a seasoned Elgarian, and he coaxes playing of special splendour here from the brass and strings, which reveal richer sonorities in the saturated textures and brilliant contrapuntal writing.”

“Edward Gardner’s conducting of Strauss’s Nietzsche-inspired symphonic poem is impressively flowing and direct while still being flexible and also alive to small details; in return the members of the National Youth Orchestra play with confidence, poise and bravura, and a lack of indulgence on Gardner’s part is refreshing to the music as a whole… However, it’s The Planets that takes the bouquets, captured in sound, as ‘Mars’ announces immediately, which is that bit more tangible – indeed the war-mongering is hurled at the listener – Gardner not driving the music but ensuring tension-packed and increasing danger; the full force of the outsized NYO is uncompromising.”

“Massenet’s lush scores can easily wilt, but on Thursday, Edward Gardner led a performance that was sumptuous without ever slogging — not grandly imposing but straightforward and sincere. Lyrical expansion never stinted on forward-moving vigor, right up to the slashing grimaces in the low strings at the very end.”

“Within seconds we were reminded of the electricity Gardner can generate. ‘Morning Mood’ and ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’ have become staled by being used as background music, but the luscious Bergen strings illuminated each piece; ‘Morning Mood’ was magical with the reedy woodwinds bringing light and life to the birdsong, and ‘The Death of Åse’ was expressively nuanced. ‘Anitra’s Dance’ conveyed a sensual
delicacy and ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’ showcased the Bergen bassoonists and the shimmering and sinister colours of the brass.”

“[…] Gardner was consistent in maintaining musical tension, which translated here into brilliant, even ferocious energy. Composed in 1943 in a New York hospital bed, the music speaks of personal as well as political turmoil, and this searing performance addressed all its aspects. Gardner’s fluid baton meant that the mysterious opening, with mournfully muted trumpets, emerged just as grippingly as the more obvious, grotesque moments, and the big folk tune of the fourth movement swept along.”

“The burst of brass that opens Jealousy cuts like Steva’s knife, the low strings a knot of shame. Chords spread like bruises, uncooled by the balm of the clarinet solo. It’s a perfect fit for Gardner, whose instinct for the tension and relaxation in Janácek’s music is superb.”Anna Picard, The Times, 10 January 2017

“Some of the songs are sinuously chromatic, a reminder of how close Sibelius came to Schoenberg’s world in the early years of the 20th century, while others rely more heavily on the 19th-century German lieder tradition, going right back to Schubert. Finley sings them all with his usual finesse and careful shading, reserving his full power for the few genuinely climactic moments, while alongside the songs Edward Gardner and his orchestra include very fine performances of three orchestral works.”

“Edward Gardner’s powerful, impassioned conducting illuminated the life-and-death struggles of the score that Elgar called ‘the best of me’. From the opening phrases to the transcendent finale, the British-born maestro spurred the orchestra, chorale, and three particularly fine soloists forward in a performance that never lost focus or momentum. At particularly dramatic moments, Gardner practically levitated off the podium, sometimes gripping his baton with both hands and flailing it as if wielding a weapon.”

“It was a brilliant debut, epitomised in the electrifying performance of Berlioz’s overture to ‘Benvenuto Cellini’, which opened the concert. This is rhythmically tricky music, but Gardner, his body language bursting with tightly coiled energy, had its full measure. The orchestra’s playing bristled with vitality and the finale was scintillatingly executed.

So, too, was the Second Suite from Ravel’s ballet “Daphnis and Chloe,” a sensual interpretation that benefited greatly from the clarity of Gardner’s baton technique and his gripping sense of theatre. He should be invited back as soon as possible.”

“Making his Minnesota Orchestra debut, Gardner demonstrated that he’s also an extraordinarily expressive artist, a graceful conductor who helped sculpt fascinating interpretations. This was evident not only on the Adams, but on a sumptuous version of Ravel’s second suite from his ballet, ‘Daphnis and Chloe’.”

“Even fervent Elgarians can get a bit sniffy about The Apostles, the oratorio saddled with the reputation of being pallidly inferior to its more popular predecessor The Dream of Gerontius … Pish! And Edward Gardner – fast establishing himself as the successor to his mentor Mark Elder as the outstanding Elgar conductor of his generation – is clearly having none of it either. His blazing commitment to this incandescent performance was enough to convince anyone that, far from being an over-blown splurge of Edwardian religiosity, The Apostles was forged in the white heat of a master’s mature genius.”

“Nothing was more thrilling than the interventions of the four brass choirs strategically positioned around the chorus, notably in the wondrous Tuba mirum and again in the Lachrymosa, and – together with the ominous thunder of four timpanists with their 16 drums, right across the stage between orchestra and chorus – it made for a momentous aural experience. It was in balancing these vast colours vividly and with calm precision that conductor Edward Gardner was so very impressive, an altogether commanding presence.”

“Having marshalled a first-class cast, and in dynamic form on the podium, it was Edward Gardner, in his final appearance as the orchestra’s principal guest conductor, who masterminded the occasion, sparky and sparkling from beginning to life-affirming final chord … Remarkably, this was a performance with neither director nor props, but with Gardner making the action flow so naturally and with such pace as to belie that fact … This was the CBSO troupe covering themselves with glory.”

“The hero of the evening for me was Edward Gardner, conducting a dramatically rich and emotionally sensitive interpretation of the score, superbly played by the orchestra. So it was in the pit rather than on stage that this Tristan had vivid life.”

“… Janáček’s Glagolitic Mass is demanding of performers and requires special treatment at every turn. Edward Gardner’s interpretation succeeds superbly by focusing on the life-affirming qualities of the work, rather than going in search of its more ceremonial aspects. The please of the Gospodi, pomiluj [Kyrie] have genuine urgency and the opening of the Slava [Gloria] is infectiously joyous. The chorus is rhythmically crisp and unfailingly responsive, most effectively in the dramatic twists and turns of the Veruju [Credo].”

“Gardner’s Mozart was noble and spacious, with ample weight in the lower strings, carefully nuanced dynamics and delicately shaded woodwind.

The colours grew wilder in the Elgar, almost narcotic in the cool choir of flutes and the soft tap of the timpani, almost gaudy in the unsteady gloss of brass and harps, yet still with a sprung quality to the bass line. The languid cello melody of the first movement was as palely beautiful as a Singer Sargent portrait subject, the Larghetto a hot house bloom, the Rondo vigorous, and the finale opulent with portamento strings.”

“Long established as one of the finest conductors of choral music, Edward Gardner turned his attention to A Child of Our Time for his latest concert with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus. [He] realised superbly the work’s compassion and fury, its innate drama and its oscillations between despair and hope. Orchestral textures were dark and lean. The choral singing blazed with intensity and fervour, nowhere more so than in the spirituals that punctuate the work like chorales in a Bach Passion.”

“His [Schoenberg’s] style had developed radically by the time he finished it 11 years later, and Mahlerian influences emerge as well as the composer’s first use of Sprechstimme, the expressionist vocal technique that hovers between singing and speaking. All this was reflected in the sweep of Gardner’s conducting, by turns luminous and incisive. He unleashed the piece’s volcanic passions while never becoming mired in its high-calorific density, and somehow avoided drowning the singers.”

“… as a dramatic and musical entity Gardner’s performance couldn’t be faulted, and with a team of soloists right out of the top drawer, he caught the score’s wonderful ambiguity too, celebrating the lushness of a post-Tristan musical world at the same time as peering over the edge into the much more uncertain and unstable world of expressionism.”

“Edward Gardner paired operatic scale with matter-of-fact clarity for an unflinching, vigorous, at times arrestingly stark account from the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, the male singers of the RSNO and Festival choruses and soloists Jukka Rasilainen and Anna Larsson. Crucially, Gardner didn’t fall for any romanticised evocations of northernness or machismo, but instead painted a harsh, lonely landscape in which Kullervo is a flawed and brutal character.”

“What brought the two contrasting works together – and made the concert such a hugely rewarding experience – was the musical personality of conductor Edward Gardner. You could tell he’s had years in the opera pit: he tackled both pieces with a keen sense of storytelling, leading the listener through their vivid musical descriptions and shifting moods expertly. He drove the RSNO onwards with some urgent direction – but he was crystal clear, and precise in his demands. And in response, the Orchestra showed what it was capable of in thrillingly broad, sweeping playing, committed and secure.”

“Was that really the Academy of Ancient Music, playing so roughly, almost raucously at times, in Mendelssohn’s ‘Scottish’ Symphony on Sunday? Yes, it was, and it was thrilling.

On Sunday afternoon, it was the English maestro Edward Gardner leading the orchestra in a program of Mendelssohn at Alice Tully Hall as part of the Mostly Mozart Festival, and he elicited real electricity in the playing. In the symphony and another Scottish-themed work, Mendelssohn’s moody concert overture “The Hebrides,” Mr. Gardner — who had also conducted two concerts by the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra over the weekend — challenged the Academy players with fast tempos, and they responded with hard-driving performances vividly evoking turbulent seas and changeable climates. But there were also moments of great delicacy, as with the evanescent pizzicatos at the end of the symphony’s Vivace non troppo movement, a quintessential Mendelssohn scherzo in all but name.

Virtuosity was rife in the playing … the performance was everywhere atmospheric and exciting.”

“The burning conviction that the CBSO’s principal guest conductor, Edward Gardner, brought to the score was obvious – he captured Tippett’s tumultuous energy and brightness, a myriad threads drawing the listener into a web of sound … With his firm grasp of overall trajectory, Gardner maintained the gradual accretion of nervous tension through the dancing scherzo and into the finale, never losing sight of the magical moments of vibrancy which recall his opera The Midsummer Marriage. The CBSO were on blistering form.”

“With vigour, playful rubato and intoxicating cantabile strings, Edward Gardnerand the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra made this tone poem sing brightly, proudly and persuasively. Both sides of Elgar’s temperament were featured in this programme: joy and despair.”

“In the Second Symphony, Gardner is consistently highly impressive … deeply imaginative, wholly at one with the music – its depth of utterance, its myriad chiaroscuro orchestration, its sudden changes of orchestral texture, and constant sense of moving forwards, even when the basic tempo (as in the middle movement) is quite slow – all are grasped and understood by this conductor, and presented to us with an admirable combination of insight, spontaneity and freshness.

There is nothing egotistical in these splendid interpretations, and the result is a set of consistently satisfying performances of the highest musical grasp and understanding. I cannot imagine anything finer then these.”

“The ENO orchestra seems to come to life under Gardner. The prelude to Act III was spellbinding and showed us the essence of their playing: the word “poise” kept coming into my head. Gardner seemed to have total control of the dynamic shaping of each phrase, with the ebb and flow precisely measured and the level set to exactly what he wanted, whether for dramatic effect or for balance with singers.”

“Edward Gardner’s conducting of his splendid orchestra was incandescent in its magnificence. The electrifying curtain-raising storm, the intricately tricky third-act ensemble, and the eerily bleak final scene were all sublimely rendered.”

“Though conducting the NYO for the first time, Edward Gardner seemed to have developed an instant rapport, igniting individual sections throughout the mysterious nocturne like fireflies. [Sage, Gateshead 7 August 2014]”

“Gardner allowed the individual ‘star’ players, notably the principal French horn and oboist, to display their striking abilities to stunning effect, while allowing for the entire ensemble to support their colleagues’ exceptional solo playing with the outstanding team effort for which the BSO is so renowned. Maestro Gardner gave the overall impression of a remarkably gifted and already accomplished musician who will have much to offer as his career progresses.”

“The other firm hand on the tiller is that of the conductor Edward Gardner, who drives the music fast and furiously without losing its warmth: he draws lovely playing from the orchestra, and relaxes into the lyrical episodes, notably the exquisite duet for soprano and mezzo-soprano and Cellini’s climactic aria of self-dedication.”

“.. an interpretation in the same league as Previn’s near legendary 1966 recording, with thrilling momentum to match.

Where Gardner and the BBC Symphony perhaps surpass Previn and the LSO is in their astonishingly accurate response to the teeming accents and dynamic markings. The result is a masterclass in how to generate formidable dramatic voltage while keeping the music’s eruptive energy on a tight rein – as in the first movement and finale, where Gardner’s precise control of tempo and decibel-level builds up, and then releases impressive firepower with minimum bombast.”

“This performance, one of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra’s series celebrating the Mendelssohn connection with their principal guest conductor Edward Gardner, swept away any notion of this as a stodgy, ponderous work. In the opening orchestral sinfonia, it was not that the meanings of the instructions maestoso and religioso were ignored; simply that any heaviness was dissipated, the music invested instead with airy, almost transparent textures and a lightness of step. Even the dotted rhythm of the recurring trombone theme took on a lively spring … in Gardner’s authoritative hands, new life was breathed into a work that suddenly seemed wrongly neglected.”

“Edward Gardner and the Birminghamsters catch the hazy ‘Scottish’ atmosphere of the Hebrides, and he is expansive in the outer movements of the Reformation, with its quotation of the Dresden Amen and Luther’s chorale, Ein feste Burg. The Italian Symphony is exhilaratingly delivered — with poetic solos in the andante con moto — especially the breathless Saltarello presto finale.”

“Edward Gardner characterises the land – and seascape of the ‘Hebrides’ Overture with a good ear for storm, surge and serenity, and the purposeful instrumental detail that he elicits is a vital factor, too, in the ‘Reformation’ Symphony.

The depth of sonority at the start (with solemn double basses and brass) yields to a powerfully executed first movement, stirring in its drive and drama, with the ensuing scherzo light yet firm of accent.

The music’s essential seriousness, well defined here, contrasts with the airy exuberance of the “Italian” Symphony, crisp, animated, warm and enchanting.”

“Gardner conducted David Alden’s production when it was new in 2009 and at the Proms in 2012. The score is fully under his skin, which means it is now implanted under ours. Details I’ve never heard seep out: some glacially beautiful, others darkly abrasive. And the great Sea Interludes are so tautly integrated into the whole canvas that I don’t really want to hear them in the concert hall again.”

“In philosophical terms, you could summarise the evening as a musical transfiguration of life through love and death – an unusually powerful dramaturgical thread for an “ordinary” symphony concert. Edward Gardner articulated some of these ideas in a short speech from the podium – a good example of how and when a conductor can communicate directly with the audience.

The orchestra played with fibre. Gardner’s skilful grading of the Tristan Prelude – where to “place” the climax and how to wind it down – suggested it may be time he conducted the entire opera at English National Opera, where he is music director. His Strauss exuded the same easy command, but it was the Webern that impressed most. The Passacaglia is not as dry or forbidding as its composer’s reputation suggests. What it needs is lucidity and sweep, passion and commitment, and Gardner gave it just that.”

“The highpoint was Edward Gardner’s conducting … it was virile when necessary, gentle when called for, without ever being heavy or uncontrolled. Best of all was an inerrant sense of pacing, through which Strauss’ most sublime conclusion before Capriccio felt both welcome and deserved.”

“Nuances of speech are crucial to the wit and the pathos of the opera. That every word came through clearly is surely due in part to the production’s German coach, Marianne Barrett. But it was also thanks to the precision work of the conductor Edward Gardner, who drew an impassioned and nuanced performance from the Met Orchestra that never overpowered the singers.”

“Australia’s oldest orchestra, the Melbourne Symphony, founded in 1906, brings high energy and finesse to these Bartók performances under the incisive baton of Edward Gardner. Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta opens mysteriously with the chromatic Andante tranquillo. The Allegro is demonic, the Adagio luscious and the Allegro full of runaway spirit and urgency.”

“Mendelssohn is being conjured out of the mists in Birmingham Town Hall, where he enjoyed some of his greatest triumphs. Under Edward Gardner’s spirited direction, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra has embarked on a live and recorded cycle of his symphonies.”

“Its acoustics were amply tested by the opening gala, given by the Guildhall Symphony Orchestra under Edward Gardner. Elgar’s swaggering Cockaigne Overture — an apt celebration of Cockneys for this quintessential London occasion — sounded terrific: the sound rich but the fortissimos not overwhelming.”

“Gardner expertly marshalled Lutosławski’s teeming textures [Lutoslawski Symphonic Variations and Piano Concerto]. He paired the two works with Holst [The Planets] … a typically brisk, abrasive account, in which no details were overlooked. Between the Variations and the Concerto he placed a beautifully restrained and delicately coloured unfolding of Egdon Heath, Holst’s masterly late tone poem … Gardner seemed to relish its palette of greys and pastels, and judged it perfectly.”

“Edward Gardner conducted the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in a performance that thrilled and moved … Gardner’s track record both as choral conductor and Britten interpreter is impeccable, and, as might be expected, his handling of the work’s complex juxtaposition of disparate elements was supremely intelligent, without losing sight of its power. Speeds were on the slow side. Formal ritual embraced and contained visceral emotion. Britten’s shifting perspectives, envisioning war as a communal catastrophe that destroys the individual soul, were exposed with horrifying clarity. The orchestral sound was broodingly dark and Mahlerian, the choral singing pitch-perfect and wonderfully committed.”Tim Ashley, The Guardian, 26 June 2013

“Gardner profiled the waves of sound in the “Sanctus” as dramatically as he ratcheted up the baleful intensity of the “Libera me”. The eerie quiet of the finale, summoning the spiritual emptiness of the battlefield, was equally well judged.”

“The piece presents several problems of direction and balance for the conductor. It’s scored for chorus and huge orchestra, a separate chamber ensemble accompanying the soloists, two organs and a boys’ choir, required to sing at an ethereal distance. In the cavernous acoustic of St Paul’s, the potential for disaster was significant but Gardner triumphed, displaying total command of his massive forces.”

“The musical inspiration that Edward Gardner discovers and imparts struck me as even more impressive than it had first time round; he is clearly one of the foremost opera conductors of our time.”Michael Tanner, The Spectator, 22 June 2013

“The Britten centenary is turning into a CD bonanza. Hot on the heels of Ian Bostridge’s song anthology comes this pairing of the two prewar concertos that announced Britten as a brilliant young composer of instrumental music. Both receive performances of heat, drive and passion, buoyed by the lively BBC Philharmonic under Edward Gardner. Shelley captures the Piano Concerto’s swirling sensuousness (with an extra track for the slow movement Britten replaced in 1945), while Little delivers the Violin Concerto with quicksilver intensity. A rapturous disc.”

“It is good to welcome back Wozzeck to English National Opera after an absence of 25 years, and even better to salute the outstanding musical quality of the performance under ENO’s talismanic music director, Edward Gardner.

His is an extremely tactile reading, more Debussyan than Mahlerian in its delicacy, serenity and atmospheric colouring, but also frighteningly intense where it matters – supremely so in the long eruptive crescendo after the Drum Major’s seduction of Marie, and again in the overwhelming grandeur of the final interlude. Gardner keeps the dialogues on a tight rein, favours light textures and shows an easy grasp of Berg’s gestural language. Played without interval, the 90-minute performance roots the drama in the music.”

Andrew Clark, Financial Times, May 2013

“This is another major achievement for conductor Edward Gardner, who is wonderfully alert to every nuance, while ratcheting up the intensity to almost unbearable levels at times.”

“Tom Randle’s Captain, sniggering, nervy and apoplectic, is a fine characterisation, as is James Morris’s monstrous Doctor. Underpinning it all is the superlative conducting of Edward Gardner, which emphasizes the raw, raucous qualities of the score but also its searing humanity.”

“Gardner delivered an impassioned introduction during the lengthy reset for the stage requirements of Bela Bartok’s Music for Strings, Percussion and Celeste, whose specific scoring for two string orchestras exploits stereophonic effects. The intensity of the opening movement’s slow fugue was beautifully modulated and, delivering precise pizzicato, the strings coped well with the ever-changing time signature and furious pace of the Allegro.”

“Witold Lutoslawski (1913-94) wrote much of his First Symphony during the second world war. The opening has an angular, witty quality mirrored in the last movement, with no hint at the turbulence of the times. In contrast, the inner sections have a strange melancholy – in the Adagio, a sorrowful string tune and mawkish oboe solo, in the Allegretto a subdued waltz. The BBCSO and Edward Gardner, in the latest of this excellent series, capture the range of moods eloquently.”

“Gardner and the Philharmonia did fine things with its [Bridge: The Sea] sensuous textures and muted turbulence. The third movement, Moonlight – Britten re-used the title for one of the interludes in Grimes – was ravishing.

The Spring Symphony was tremendous. Britten always brings out the best in Gardner, whose understanding of this unwieldy score was exceptional. From the opening evocation of the chill of winter to the jubilant closing processional based on Sumer Is Icumen In, the sometimes meandering emotional trajectory was immaculately negotiated and paced.”

“Britten’s Spring Symphony is at present somewhat less elusive than spring itself. Last month in Birmingham, this month in London: Edward Gardner passed the baton from the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra to the Philharmonia where, using Birmingham’s own unsurpassed choral forces, he conducted another light-filled performance of Britten’s first large-scale work for chorus and orchestra — and the sap was certainly rising.”
Hilary Finch, The Times, 19 February 2013

“Principal guest conductor Edward Gardner presided over a powerfully committed account of Bridge’s Suite The Sea … Gardner’s reading was perceptively shaped, responsive to Bridge’s polyglot language (Stravinsky in particular, but thankfully none of the mawkishness of some of his English contemporaries), and drawing particular character from the remarkable CBSO woodwind soloists … There were smiles on so many faces as we ventured out into the night to see what winter had to throw at us.”

“Edward Gardner begins his Szymanowski survey for Chandos at the beginning, with the Polish composer’s first orchestral work, the Concert Overture Op 12. His gloriously broad and sweeping account of a work that reflects Szymanowski’s seemingly boundless admiration for Richard Strauss’s symphonic poems sets the tone for a disc that emphasises the composer’s late romantic affiliations rather than his modernist ones, especially with the BBC Symphony Orchestra on opulent form.”

“Mr. Gardner elicited spirited and polished playing from the young musicians throughout … All sections of the Juilliard ensemble shone in the intense and beautifully detailed performance of the Mahler symphony led by Mr. Gardner, from the radiant opening, with its shimmering A, to the exuberant conclusion.”

“The performances continue the highly favorable impression of this series to date, with Gardner securing playing of real immediacy and finesse from a BBC Symphony Orchestra that sounds as fully engaged in the lighter aspect of the composer’s music as in its more searching utterances.”